The Contrarian – Players and Prayers

Ian Gooding

2015-05-17

MikeGreen

Is there anything to the “contract year” phenomenon?

Everyone has heard of the idea that players in the last season of their contracts play better in order to do better with their future deal. They either earn an extension with their current team or seek a hefty raise on the open market.

We see examples of it every year, and this season is no exception.

Back on January 18, USA Today's Kevin Allen posted a list of what he thought were the Top 25 unrestricted free agent players for this summer.

Similarly on April 28, Sportsnet's Luke Fox posted his Top 15 UFA players.

Even if their rankings of the best free agent players available are different, both will list players that will induce you to believe the idea of contract years is a major incentive to players. They will perform better because they have a carrot dangling in front of them.

Allen and Fox do not explicitly say that this is the case. It is us who infer from these and others lists we come across that assume it must be true.

Player	Position	Team	Age	Cap Hit	USA Today	Sportsnet
Mike Green	D	WSH	29	$6,083,333	4	3
Martin St. Louis	RW	NYR	39	$5,625,000	9	6
Paul Martin	D	PIT	34	$5,000,000	7	8
Lubomir Visnovsky	D	NYI	38	$4,750,000	23
Erik Cole	LW	DET	36	$4,500,000	25
Drew Stafford	RW	WIN	29	$4,000,000	21
Christian Ehrhoff	D	PIT	32	$4,000,000	2	10
Antti Niemi	G	SJS	31	$3,800,000		11
Antoine Vermette	C	CHI	32	$3,750,000	5	7
Justin Williams	RW	LAK	33	$3,650,000	14	14
Francois Beauchemin	D	ANA	34	$3,500,000	13	13
Johnny Oduya	D	CHI	33	$3,375,000	10
Cody Franson	D	NSH	27	$3,300,000	6	4
Michael Frolik	RW	WIN	27	$3,300,000	19	15
Barret Jackman	D	STL	34	$3,166,666	22
Jeff Petry	D	MON	27	$3,075,000	12
Joel Ward	RW	WSH	34	$3,000,000		12
Jiri Tlusty	C	WIN	27	$2,950,000	18
Curtis Glencross	LW	WSH	32	$2,550,000	24
Brad Richards	C	CHI	35	$2,000,000	17
Eric Fehr	C	WSH	29	$1,500,000	20
Matt Beleskey	LW	ANA	26	$1,350,000	11 📢 advertisement:	9
Jhonas Enroth	G	DAL	26	$1,250,000	16
Mike Ribeiro	C	NSH	35	$1,050,000	8	2
Carl Soderberg	C	BOS	29	$1,008,333	3	5
Devan Dubnyk	G	MIN	29	$800,000		1

Note: USA Today's list is missing Johnny Boychuk (1) and Mats Zuccarello (15) because they signed extensions.

We could go through the list and argue who should be ranked higher or lower. We could analyze if these players deserve raises with their next deal. We could ponder which teams they will end up on.

The fact is that they have done well enough this season that they will be sought after by teams.

What about the others?

According to GeneralFanager.com, there are a total of 293 unrestricted free agents. Here are the Top players not on Allen's or Fox's lists, based on their Cap Hit.

Player	Position	Team	Age	Cap Hit
Shawn Horcoff	C	DAL	36	$5,500,000
Sergei Gonchar	D	MON	41	$5,000,000
Martin Erat	RW	ARI	33	$4,500,000
Tomas Fleischmann	LW	ANA	30	$4,500,000
Mike Fisher	C	NSH	34	$4,200,000
Chris Stewart	RW	MIN	27	$4,150,000
Andrej Meszaros	D	BUF	29	$4,125,000
Daniel Briere	C	COL	37	$4,000,000
Zbynek Michalek	D	STL	32	$4,000,000
Eric Brewer	D	TOR	36	$3,875,000
Sheldon Souray	D	ANA	38	$3,666,666
Michael Ryder	RW	NJD	35	$3,500,000
Bryan Allen	D	MON	34	$3,500,000
Matt Cullen	C	NSH	38	$3,500,000
Scottie Upshall	LW	FLA	31	$3,500,000
Jan Hejda	D	COL	36	$3,250,000
Jarret Stoll	C	LAK	32	$3,250,000
Bryce Salvador	D	NJD	39	$3,166,666
Tomas Kopecky	RW	FLA	33	$3,000,000
Robyn Regehr	D	LAK	35	$3,000,000
Marek Zidlicky	D	DET	38	$3,000,000

Note: Rich Peverley was removed from the list because he is on the long-term injury reserve list.

What happened? Did they not realize that they were in their contract year?

You could argue that Mike Fisher does not belong on the list especially since it has been rumored that he is not considering retiring anymore. The other guys had rough years though.

Their teams are looking forward to seeing them go, making cap and roster space for new players. Montreal's Marc Bergevin has already indicated that he will not try to keep Sergei Gonchar. Martin Erat could not have been chased out of Arizona fast enough and now I'm reading that the same could be true for Marek Zidlicky.

The players on this list are slightly a bit older than the first one, but they are within the same range.

It cuts both ways. You have to be prepared, especially if you are in a keeper league and are trading over the summer. Some owners like to use it as an influencing point during trade negotiations.

Fans and teams pray for contract years, for good and not so good reasons.

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The Contrarian – Roster Roosters

UPCOMING GAMES

Nov 21 - 19:11	WSH	vs	COL
Nov 21 - 19:11	CBJ	vs	T.B
Nov 21 - 19:11	OTT	vs	VGK
Nov 21 - 19:11	DET	vs	NYI
Nov 21 - 19:11	BOS	vs	UTA
Nov 21 - 19:11	N.J	vs	CAR
Nov 21 - 20:11	STL	vs	S.J
Nov 21 - 20:11	CHI	vs	FLA
Nov 21 - 21:11	CGY	vs	NYR
Nov 21 - 21:11	EDM	vs	MIN